Remo Fernandes - Other Collaborations and Work

Other Collaborations and Work

In 1995, during the Channel V Music Awards, Remo, on a bass guitar, and Roger Taylor, on drums, played with Led Zeppelin band members, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant.

When Pepsi USA entered Indian markets in the 1990s as Leher Pepsi, they signed up Remo for an endorsement deal and got him to star in their first two launch ad films, making advertising history in India.

In February 2005, Remo collaborated with Jethro Tull along with renowned Indian percussionist Sivamani, for a concert held in Dubai. They performed tracks such as Mother Goose, Locomotive Breath, and Remo's now very famous Flute Kick also informally called "the flute song". Jethro Tull also backed Remo as he sang his own 'Bombay City' and 'Maria Pita Che'.

Until recently, Remo has participated in, and helped popularise a local festival called the Siolim Zagor.

In 2001, three Microwave Papadums band members- Dharamedra Hirve, Selwyn Pereira and Victor Alvares, and Remo's personal assistant Sunil Redkar, were killed in a motorvehicle road accident in Kanpur, on the way to the airport after a particularly spectacular concert there. Remo was devastated and stayed away from music and performances for a year.

In 2002 Remo released two albums which, once again, were very much ahead of their time for India. The music was contemplative, orchestral, complex. The album were "India Beyond" and "Symphonic Chants". Tracks from "India Beyond" were signed to and released by Buddha Bar, Paris, France, and Opium Garden, Miami, USA. In India these albums went unnoticed, as neither record companies nor the media knew what to make of them.

In 2003, on his 50th birthday, Remo held a reunion concert in Goa with many of his former bands; The Beat 4, Indiana, and The Savages, besides friends like The Valadares Sisters and Lucio Miranda. It was a 4-hour unforgettable concert attended by 25,000 people from ages 8 to 80.

The last album Remo released through a record company in India was "Muchacha Latina". For the title song he scripted, directed and edited the music video. The music scene in India had began to change once more, though, and all attention was now given to Bollywood music. Former pop/rock artists were now composing and performing exclusively for the celluloid world. Record companies simply did nothing to invest in the promotion of non-film music, which they called 'private' albums.

From then on, Remo made songs which were closest to his heart right from the start: socio-political comments and critiques, exposing corruption, communalism and other evils in India, and motivating people against them. These songs he distributed on the Internet for free, together with their music videos once again scripted, directed and edited by himself. The most memorable of these are "India, I Cry", "India Against Corruption", and "Vote: Tit for Tat".

In 2011 Remo was approached by the Election Commission of India to be their 'Youth Icon for Ethical Voting' in Goa, and billboards with Remo's pictures and messages were put up all over the state. "Vote: Tit for Tat" was composed specially to encourage the Goan people to vote out blatantly corrupt ministers with official criminal records who had been ruling the roost in the Goa Government for decades. The video went viral on YouTube, and the election results were unprecedented; Goa had the highest voter turnout ever, the highest voter turnout in youth aged 18–25 years, and 90% of the aforementioned criminal ministers were voted out of power.

In 2011 Remo also produced and sang a song for a new film by Bejoy Nambiar, titled 'David'. It is slated for release in early 2013.

Remo is presently working on three personal albums, one of them being a re-recording of his very first 'Goan Crazy!'. He says: "A 4-track Portastudio recording was OK in Goa in 1984, but I'd like this album, my first, to be remembered in today's state-of-the-art quality."